"To hear the IRS tell it, it wasn’t just the hard drive on Lerner’s computer that crashed; it was the hard drive on six other computers. The agency also lacked a centralized archive, it says now, and employed an archaic practice of re-using the tapes backing up its system every six months -- thereby erasing the material already there. Who knew the IRS was so frugal? In a similar vein, IRS employees had absurdly low limits for how many emails they could store. And the agency apparently allowed IRS employees to decide for themselves which emails constituted an official record, which they are required by law to retain.

Is any of this possible? Nancy Flynn, executive director and founder of the Ohio-based ePolicy Institute, thinks it could be. When Republicans heard the latest dog-ate-two-years-of-my-homework explanation, they thought cover-up. Flynn, who trains and consults companies on how to handle digital communications, thought of all the organizations she’s encountered which were similarly cluelessness about electronic record storage."

I've grown jaded over time, as most of us do, but it still deeply saddens me when the government trots out the "we're not corrupt, we're just incompetent" excuse. As if that were better. I'd be more comfortable hearing the administration say "of course we attacked our political foes, sorry we got caught" than I am hearing "we can't provide you with proof that we didn't attack our political foes, because we lack a basic understanding of how to comply with digital record laws that we create."

Posted by examinerebb on 6/20/2014 1:10:00 PM (view original):I've grown jaded over time, as most of us do, but it still deeply saddens me when the government trots out the "we're not corrupt, we're just incompetent" excuse. As if that were better. I'd be more comfortable hearing the administration say "of course we attacked our political foes, sorry we got caught" than I am hearing "we can't provide you with proof that we didn't attack our political foes, because we lack a basic understanding of how to comply with digital record laws that we create."

I'm not sure how you think the IRS has "political foes", especially since liberal groups were targeted as well.

HOW! Let me be the first to say I think the Redskins is a racist name and check out my jewelry.

I'm also pleading the fifth. And i'm innocent. Pluswise I'm pleading the fifth anyways even though I declared innocence.

And while we're at it I think you should now know my e-mails were lost years ago in a horrible computer crash.

I don't have to tell you why I didn't tell you guys years ago because I pleaded the fifth even though I declared my innocence directly after.

We do what we want here. That's how we roll in Obama World.

And now that you know my e-mail crashed, I suppose you should also know the computers of six of my best friends and co-workers also crashed. The ones that would know anything about anything including my BFF who talked to the White House every week instead of the 3 times we talked to BUSH over 8 years.